Windows Hotfix Downloader: Download Windows Updates Offline

Windows Update is a feature provided by the Microsoft to keep your system updated automatically. Windows Update keeps the system running with the latest security updates and hotfixes. The updates are automatically downloaded and installed by Windows Update program in Windows.

Windows Hotfix Downloader is a nifty program which downloads Windows updates setups for offline installation. It has a long list of options which add up to the usefulness of this program. This simple program provides you the following features:

Download Windows updates (McRip – Windows 7, Windows 8)

Download Office updates (McRip – 2010, 2013)

Install/uninstall updates

Integrate updates

Windows update cleanup

Check installed updates

Check Available Updates

Unlike the Windows Update utility, Windows HotFix Downloader does not run in background nor does it install the updates automatically. You have to manually check if the desired updates are available and select them to start installation. It requires you to select the Windows or Office version 2010/2013.

Select the update e.g Office 2010 x64

It will display a list of available updates

Select the updates you want to install

Click ‘Download’

Note that you can’t cancel the download process once it has been initiated. You can only pause a download or uninstall it at later time. The status bar displays the remaining download time, how much data has been transferred and its percentage.

It will display a dialog box on successful completion of download with a brief summary.

Search for an Update

‘Search for updates’ option lets you search an update from the current list of updates. You need to enter the complete or partial update name in the search box.

Check for new Windows updates

To your surprise, Windows HotFix downloader accepts the existence of Windows Update and allows you to enjoy default update feature.

Go to Options -> Check for Windows Update

It detects the updates that were installed by Windows Update and uninstall them with a single click.

Go to Options ->Windows Update Cleanup

Set Download Directory

Set the temporary folder so that all your downloads are gathered at one place.

Go to Options -> Change Temp Directory.

If you want to change the download location for once only, you may select that location as:

Move the cursor to ‘Download Path’.

Select ‘Browse’ -> Select desired folder.

Check for installed updates

If you want to see the list of recently installed updates on your system:

Go to the options -> Installed Updates

It provides you complete information about the update including the name, type and date of installation. You may want to uninstall any update:

Right click on the update –> Uninstall Selected Update

Filter the update results

A handy way to filter the available update list is to use the filter option. It can filter the McRip Updates and the McRip Office Updates.

Set Priority of Windows HotFix Downloader

By default, the Windows HotFix Downloader priority level is set to normal. However, you may set them to six different levels ranging from below normal level to real-time downloading.

Go to Options -> Process Priority -> High

Windows Hotfix Downloader can be a very handy program if you know what your system needs. However, it does not separate out the installed updates and uninstalled updates. You may also download the patches for your system from Microsoft Update Catalog or configure the Windows Update tool according to your preferences.

5 Comments

Usman, we pay a lot of money for traffic in my country. What you don’t say about WHD is whether it can download Windows updates into some sort of cache where they can be made available for multiple other machines. And that’s updates for multiple OS versions – XP, Vista, etc, 32-bit, 64.
And I’d also like to know what the initial download is likely to be – tens of gigabytes? The install to clients isn’t clear – can it be done over a LAN or do we need to transport a dual-cabled (power/signal) external USB disk from machine to machine?
And this applies to all the updaters you’ve reviewed.
Thanks.

Yes exactly. You can actually download the hotfixes and updates on one computer and run them on all computers on your network, whether it be over the LAN or through any other portable means. If you are using a centralized Windows network, I would highly recommend installing Windows Server Update Services on one of your servers. This will automate the process of downloading the updates only ones for the whole network and installing the updates on the client computers automatically.